


Window to the soul

by madnessmuse



Category: COD zombies, Call of Duty (Video Games), nazi zombies
Genre: Amnesia, Gen, Introspection, Memory Loss, set during black ops 1, wow it sure has been a hot minute since i wrote for this fandom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-01-16
Packaged: 2021-03-13 16:53:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28781550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madnessmuse/pseuds/madnessmuse
Summary: His body ached and yet his mind whirled like an uncontrollable storm.It was a familiar feeling.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8





	Window to the soul

It was a quiet night. Tank Dempsey would almost have described it as peaceful, it if weren't for all the damn rotten corpses and bloodied swastikas hanging around. Sitting on top a dusty crate, long deserted by its previous users, the marine sighed. His body ached and yet his mind whirled like an uncontrollable storm. 

It was a familiar feeling. 

On night's like these, long buried memories of days past came back to him. Just glimpses, nothing tangible. Like tiny pieces of an unsolvable puzzle. Memories of past battles, faces of comrades Dempsey couldn't quite remember but hadn't yet fully forgotten either. Faces of captured German soldiers, barely even out of their teens. Their eyes wide open in fear pleading with him. Staring into him just moments before he snuffed out their life. 

Eerily, Dempsey could recall the way their eyes went blank, lifeless after he pulled the trigger. He'd never shown them any mercy, never felt any remorse after gunning them down like dogs. 

Still didn't, if he was being honest with himself. Because that was war. It came with the territory. Young men died all the time for their countries, their beliefs. Besides, the marine doubted the krauts' actions would have been any different, if they were the ones holding the gun. At least he had enough mercy to make it quick. 

No, it wasn't the brief glimpses of battles long past that so unsettled the American. That honour goes to the flashes of his past home life. Memories of past friends and lovers he could no longer remember the names of. Memories of people that may have even been loved ones a long time ago - of a little girl beaming up at him, or a woman, so familiar, so beautiful... 

The woman and the child, they appeared to him often, flashing before his eyes on nights like these. But Tank could never remember their names. A cold chill travelled down the length of his spine. He knew he never would. 

He couldn't even remember his own name after all. 

Bitterness seeped through him. Now the only 'family' he had consisted of a sadistic German psychopath, an alcoholic commie and an honour obsessed imperial. It was like some kind of shitty social experiment being played on all of them: 'Hey what happens if we take four of the most fucked up individuals from warring countries and pit them together against zombies? Will the flesh addicts kill them before they kill each other? Find out in the next instalment of the Fuck Dempsey's Life Show!' He could picture the advertiser's cheesy, fake as shit grin as the guy droned on and on, peddling more crap. 

The thought almost made him snicker. It would be hilarious if wasn't happening to him after all. Hell, he'd probably watch that show himself. 

But this wasn't some entertainment show; it was reality. A shitty reality that was tiring, confusing and that had long worn out its welcome. 

Sure it was fun, at first, slaughtering the undead freaksacks. But even that was beginning to lose its luster; fighting now seemed more like a boring chore, as mundane as washing dishes in some soup factory, then something entertaining. His eyelids felt heavier everyday he was forced to drag himself out of his makeshift bed. Some days Tank couldn't sleep at all, the buzz of adrenaline pumping through his veins ever hours after yet another near death experience. Now he only fought for a chance to see the sunrise tomorrow. A chance for survival, maybe even one day for a chance to live a normal life. 

No maggot addicts, no Germans, no time travel. None of that crap. Just him, some good friends, a good woman and some cold hard booze to wash away every last dredge of this shithole. It was a nice dream and however slim that chance was, it was all the marine had left. All that was worth fighting for. 

It was funny, really. That one little girl stood in the way of all that. That a child had so easily fucked up their lives, nearly killing them over and over again. But he knew this was no ordinary little girl. No, this kid was batshit crazy. Maybe even crazier then Richtofen - and that was fucking saying something. 

Creepy girl also controlled those freakbags; sending the maggot addicts after them even across time itself. How, he had no idea. Maybe this 'Samantha' wasn't human, maybe she was some demon like Tak thought. One thing's for sure though, the German knew how. Probably knew a whole buncha things he'd never tell the rest of 'em. Tank could see it in the sneaky bastard's eyes. 

The marine scowled, remembering all the times he'd caught the kraut glaring at him with those poisonous eyes, the violent intent within them crystal clear and barely restrained. Waiting. It happened so often these days it didn’t even phase him. Usually he'd just tell the doc to fuck off or something along those lines. 

However when he first met the German, back in that dreary swamp, Dempsey couldn't deny that something in those eyes disturbed him. Not that'd he'd ever breathe a word of it to anyone, 'specially the fucker in question, but there was something off, something so deeply wrong in them. It had taken him a while to figure out why. 

Other than them lighting up in sadistic delight at the freak bags’ often long and unnecessarily drawn out deaths, there was nothing in them. No emotion. No signs of what he was thinking or feeling or scheming. 

They were empty, vacant. Not unlike the meatsacks' in a creepy way. 

He’d never known a guy that appeared so dead inside.

Not even those of the most hardened veterans, the men that’d seen the nastiest shit imaginable and yet lived through it all. 

Richtofens' eyes... there was something monstrous in them, something downright evil to the core. 

It was like the doctor lacked a soul. Like something had drained out all the humanity in the man and replaced it with this animalistic energy, this utter need to cause violence and death wherever the lunatic went. It didn't help that the German ranted about 'voices' either, seemingly without any concern to how deranged it made him appear. 

Richtofen didn't seem to care about what any of them thought of him, really. He made no attempt to control his rabid mood swings or even acknowledge them, made barely any attempts to really connect with him or the other guys in a way that came naturally to pretty much any sane person. Hell, Nikolai and Tak hated eachothers' guts but they atleast still talked. Even if it was, admittedly, only to sling insults at one another. 

While the rest of them would chatter amongst themselves in the few hours of free time the brat spared them, the doctor would stalk off, brooding in some dark corner in the run down building. 

What the hell did he do all night? What the fuck was he up to?

His curiosity was peaked, in spite of his intense dislike of the kraut. 

The bastard never told them jackshit about what the plan actually was, only that he supposedly had one. Hell, Dempsey still had no idea why they came here of all places, or when exactly they were supposed to be leaving. 

Dempsey scowled, his grip on his makeshift chair tightening. 

It was about time he forced some answers out of the German.


End file.
